Charlie's Great Day

I rode Charlie this morning - she was the only one that missed out on attention yesterday! :) We have been working on picking up her back feet every time I groom her, and today was her best yet. I put a rope around her pastern, and then say "FOOT" while pulling on the rope, and today she responded really well just to my voice, and I did not have to pull hard on the rope before she lifted her back feet up really well. My goal is to have her safe enough for us to trim her while sedated. She did that a few years ago while she was in training without any trouble, but we have not had much success since then.

We went out to the ring and I started playing the "friendly" game with her, but Charlie was more interested in lunging to show me she knew what to do. We walked and trotted both directions - with Charlie picking a point where she wanted to stop and go the other way on her own. (I try to walk a fine line between making a horse do what I want and combining it with their natural desires, so long as they are not harmful or outright disobedient). Charlie was very laid back at the walk and trot, and did not want to lunge for a long time today. So I mounted up, and she felt very energetic at the walk - like she was excited to have me up, and wanted to show me what she could do! I let her move up into the trot and she seemed delighted to be trotting under saddle. I made sure to ask her to halt before we got all the way around to be sure she was listening, and she was, and then we walked and went back into the trot - this time at my request. It seemed that her "power steering" kicked in today. She listened really well to me asking her to turn - sometimes too well, and I had to be sure not to over correct her when I was working on keeping her straight along the outside of the ring. She likes the side close to the barn better than the other side for some reason. We had a few times around the "open" end of the ring where I had to use a little bit more muscle to steer her, but mostly she was so much better than we started just a few rides ago!

We trotted quite a bit today, and at the end her reward was to walk outside of the ring in the pasture - but then she turned the manual steering back on. :) She just wanted to go back to the barn, and it took some strongarming her to go the other direction. She listened, and finally gave in and understood she had to listen to me. We did some circles in the field both directions, then walked back into the ring to dismount. (Have to make sure she never gets the idea that she can go back to the barn and get out of work!) It overall was a fantastic, fun ride on Charlie. I hope to see Harlan riding her soon!